Shopping Posts

PDD Gift Guide 2018

Find something for everyone on your gift-giving list with PDD’s annual curated gift guide. It’s a bit different than most gift guides in that it’s not a list of stores that advertise with PDD — it’s a list of items created in our region, chosen simply because they are nifty.

PDD Gift Guide 2017

With an abundance of local craft fairs and new shops featuring local artists and products, supporting and buying local seems to be getting easier and easier in Duluth. With that in mind we bring you the annual PDD Gift Guide, a list of ideas with a local connection. As in previous years, we’ll kick it off with 15 suggestions. If you have your own ideas, or if you’re a local maker, feel free to add products and links in the comments.

Shopping Alternative Ways of Thinking

Duluth Alternative Shopping

I went shopping in the most unusual shops in Downtown Duluth.

They Aren’t Paid Enough to Be So Nice at This Time of Year: A Nod to Cashiers in the Holidays

Not the self-checkout at the Duluth Target, but I like it.

Not the self-checkout at the Duluth Target, but I like it

I was noting the new self-checkout at Target. I don’t like it. It feels like Wal-Mart, which is enough to make me never use it.  But beyond that irrational knee-jerk, it feels like Target would like to create a shopping experience in which I interact with no one whatsoever.  If I wanted that, I would shop at target.com. Which I do for things not carried at the Duluth Target. (I still can’t believe there will be only one Target in our area soon. Aldi will still draw me to Souptown, I guess.)

So I was really happy when I decided to try it today, and the coupon system stymied me, and a cashier walked over and hung out until I was happily rung through.  Human touch.